We all know the obnoxious sound of a Harley Davidson, with a fine tuned exhaust system designed to be as loud as possible, but that may be a fad of the past. Harley Davidson is unveiling its first ever electric motorcycle at an invitation only event Monday in New York.

The event is designed to get feedback from riders, so Harley Davidson can find tune the bike, which will hit the market in a few years. There currently is no market at all for full sized electric motorcycles, the ones that do exist are smaller, and not particularly popular in America. Forgoing the traditional chrome look, the motorcycle looks like it just came off the set of TRON, in the best way possible. 

"It does validate what we've been doing; it adds additional credibility to it. It is certainly going to draw more people's attention to electric motorcycles. The marketing horsepower of Harley-Davidson is going to be able to do things for us that we can't do on our own," said Scot Harden, vice president of global marketing at Zero Motorcycles, an electric motorcycle sales company.

Another major hurdle Harley Davidson has yet to overcome is the limited range offered by electric motorcycles. In electric cars the batteries are the biggest and heaviest component, but a motorcycle can't have half a ton of batteries. Current batteries typically must be recharged after about 130 miles, which is only about 30 minutes to an hour.

Harley President Matt Levatich said he expects technology to improve and that the company is less interested in immediate demand than long-term potential.

"When you ride a motorcycle, it's the movement of the top of the bike side-to-side that gives you agility in regard to making turns. So, if I put weight low in a motorcycle, I can turn faster. I can drop the bike down and make quicker moves," said Gary Gauthier, of NextEnergy, a Detroit-based nonprofit with expertise in electric vehicles.

Jeff Richlen, Harley's lead engineer on LiveWire, put it this way: "Some people may get on it thinking, 'golf cart,' and they get off thinking, 'rocket ship.'"